Alma Mater
by carmesdi
Summary: When Henry needs to make contact with an old college professor, Tesla is sent along as well. With tensions high since the events in Old City last summer, even those humans unaware of Abnormals can tell something is up. While Henry enjoys his old stomping grounds, Nikola begins to feel a familiar sense of dread... Set post Season 4, short story, complete!
1. Arrival

**First time writer! This should be a short few chapter story, starts light with a bit of edge at the end. Reviews would be awesome, I'm not much of a creative writer so I want to know what works and what doesn't!**

**Disclaimer: Nothing Sanctuary is mine. I wish.**

**Setting: Recently after Season 4 ending. Everyone's settled in to the New Sanctuary but up on the surface things are still kinda shook up from the events in SFN2.**

Looking around, for the first time in his unnaturally long lifetime, Nikola realized he was a bit envious of Henry Foss.

_Dammit, I am not!_

_..._

_Crap. I am. _He couldn't even really lie to himself at this point. But he wasn't going to let the insufferable wolf pup know it. This trip was getting more and more unbearable. He was starting to think Helen had made him accompany Foss as some kind of punishment.

...

Ok, it was definitely as a punishment.

"Honestly, how can you have such pride in this institute? It's so new, so ... American." He tried to drawl, hiding his admiration as he walked past another fully stocked biochemistry laboratory (the third they'd passed on this floor alone). "There are living alumni from the first graduating class."

"Dude, 1) that's not true and 2) I know it's not ancient like Oxford, but this place is awesome! Best two years of my life!" Henry was scampering through the halls, bright-eyed and eager. "Computer programming, electrical engineering, robotics, physics…. AND really hot nerdy girls."

Henrik just couldn't stop gushing, could he? He then went on to mumble some disclaimer concerning the attractiveness and intelligence of his still very pregnant girlfriend…. Like Nikola cared.

When this trip started, he thought he was being punished for that small fire in the lab by being forced to play babysitter. Now he realized that this was Helen's revenge for each time he'd complained about the conditions of her labs.

"What happened - did you fail out after 2 years?" Nikola was only partially paying attention as he snarled this, realizing that those damn 20-year-old trust fund punks in the next room had a better machine room than he had for the first 75 years of his scientific career. And what were they doing?! Making key chains with their names on them for giggles. He felt more like the tormented Tantalus now than he had at any point in his struggles controlling his vampiric blood lust.

"No, I took every class I needed and went back to working at the Sanctuary, man!" Henry laughed; still thinking Tesla's attention was focused on his stories. "College is fun but it's a bit, well, normal. Much as I liked it here, I wanted to get back to the real work!"

"Sure you didn't just get homesick? Couldn't make any friends and slunk back home to Mommy?" came the next biting questions from one increasingly irate vampire. That one made Henry look up and notice Tesla's gaze, quickly realizing what was behind this recent escalation of snark. He snickered, but this brought back Tesla's focus and soon he was staring into a very steely glare, causing him to go to silent.

_Damn kids. Stupid university. Don't know how good they've got it. I'd like to see them have to cope without electricity YOU'RE WELCOME FOR THAT BY THE WAY._

Tesla only realized he might have said that last part out loud when he started getting funny looks from the students passing them in the halls.

"Let's go find this friend of yours. NOW, mutt."

As Tesla slunk off, Henry rolled his eyes but stayed quiet and lead the way, content to know that Nikola Tesla – THE Nikola Tesla – was jealous of him.

Best. Field trip. Ever.


	2. Acclimatization

**This aspect of the story is inspired by Neil Gaiman's short story "Changes" from the book Smoke and Mirrors. Can't recommend the book highly enough, though it is very dark, definitely a T and even M at some points. This won't get nearly as dark, though it's heading towards a tiny bit of angst at the end.**

**Reviews mean the world to me! Would love to hear what you think.**

* * *

Nikola had been in that blasted office for 5 minutes and he was already bored. Plus he was a bit hungry. Not that the he actually needed to eat, but he liked to, more than sitting around listening to Henry talk with Professor… Ok, so he hadn't been paying attention enough to catch the guy's name.

_Wolfgang wouldn't shut up about all that computer science and electronics, and Helen sends him to talk to the guy who taught the only anthropology course the boy took. Not fair._

He had stood up and walked out as soon as they'd started talking about some annoyingly boring region in Tibet. No one questioned him as he had continued exploring the halls; for once, his usual outfit of an Oxford shirt and vest allowed him to blend in. He was almost tempted to walk into a seminar and start talking, just to see if anyone noticed he wasn't a professor. Maybe even try to make some students think they'd forgotten some crucial piece of homework. Oh, the possibilities...

Finally finding the exit, he wrapped himself in his coat and scarf and stepped out into the bitter cold of mid-February. He had spotted a nice café around the block when they first arrived, so he wandered over there. In a sleepy college town like this, no one would be selling wine at lunch hour, which was a massive disappointment, but there had to be something decent to nibble on.

In a half hour he was back on campus, settled on a bench with a halfway decent roast beef sandwich. He sat back and was attempting to think through his most recent failed experiment when he realized that something was off. He couldn't place his finger on it, which bothered him almost as much as Foss' exuberance about this place, but something was stopping him from blocking out his surroundings and focusing.

He began to look around and could not figure out what was causing his unease. This place was the epitome of typical college life. Students running about and tacky fliers scattered on the grounds advertising this club and that fundraiser.

Nikola did have to admit there was a charm to this place, one that had been missing at Oxford. He loved his time there – it was where he had met Helen and all the other members of the Five. Here, however, the student body was all here by choice, not obligation to their family and/or social status. Men, and women, were seeking out their own individual futures with passion and resources that he could only have dreamed of.

But they were all so normal. So much wasted potential. They shuffled from class to class in giggling groups, discussing TV shows or what a cruel grader they'd had for that last exam. Each looked straight out of a catalogue, the epitome of a typical boring human teenager.

He sat straight up with a jolt.

**_That was it, that was exactly it_**_._ _**They were the epitome of typical humans. **_**Every**_** single one of them.**_

They were all wearing name brand coats, the same sneakers and snow boots, all with normal colored hair and no piercings beyond their ears. They all walked at a similar relaxed gait, all smiling to show mouths of white, perfectly aligned teeth, as they all chatted about the same generic topics. They belonged in ads in magazines or on TVs.

As he looked closer at a group of students standing near him, he began to notice more and more discrepancies. They were all done to the nines; each girl had perfectly done makeup, with earrings that matched their nail polish, and each guy had just enough hair gel to achieve that whimsical mussed look. _One he accomplished without any gel at all, thank you very much. _They did not talk too loud, were not arguing, and were all getting along just wonderfully.

Scanning the whole campus again, he could spot the odd student who did not fit the pattern. A few had bags under their eyes; some had the odd freckle or a bad case of acne. But overall, they were all just perfect examples of human normalness.

_What the hell is this, Stepford University? How did Foss possibly not notice this?_

As dumb as Foss was, he couldn't believe this hadn't even pinged the boy's radar in two years. He took another look at that nearby group. With his enhanced senses, he could spot a glint in their eyes. Almost none of them ever touched their faces except near their ears, carefully touching at some localized annoyance. A few of them wore the most high tech watches on the market today, the ones that monitored heart rate and much, much more.

He was not Sherlock Holmes, but he had been his friend. He was not clueless to the art of abductive reasoning (or, as the rest of the world liked to call it, incorrectly, "deduction"). So, what did he see?

_The glint of colored contacts._

_The itch of the edge of a delicate prosthetic._

_Constant monitoring of one's biometrics._

He knew what Henry saw in this place, though he wondered to what extent the boy was truly aware of it. He knew why Helen had insisted he come.

These weren't boring normal college students. They were Abnormals. Abonrmals hiding in plain sight.


	3. Anticipation

As was the case with many of his great discoveries, Nikola Tesla was now having an enormous amount of fun. He had been sitting on the bench for the better part of an hour playing "Abnormal or Not?" He had not, however, been able to come up with a better name for the game. It seems "De-Vamper" was less of a fluke, and more evidence that though his conversational wit was par to known, his naming skills were rather terrible.

_Girl with purple hair? Human._

_Boy with lab coat but no obvious bags under his eyes? Abnormal._

_Girl in 4 inch stilettos in the middle of winter? Abn-….. Well….. _

_Oh, and a slight bump in her coat that could be a tail. Abnormal. _

He was broken out of this game by a dull roar coming from somewhere nearby. He turned his head to the right to see that someone had sat down next to him on the bench, totally unbeknownst to him. She was bundled up for the weather, and had her ear buds jammed into her ears, pumping out some kind of horrible attempt at music that had been the cause of his distraction. She made no attempt to acknowledge him, so he quickly grew bored and turned back to his game.

_Boy with dragon tattoo on his neck? Human._

_Girl with tattoos of scales on her neck? Hmmm…..Could be makeup on top of real scales….Or –_

This time he was thrown off by the very distinct smell of human blood, very close by. He tried to keep his nostrils from flaring as he turned back to his companion on the bench. Her ear buds had now fallen from her ears into her lap, still pounding out some kind of dreadful noise. There was a single drop of blood on the left bud and as he looked up, he saw her placing a finger gingerly to her very swollen left ear, the source of the bleed. It seems she had in fact forced the bud in so far that even her ears had rejected her horrible taste in music.

However, even with her questionable playlist choices, he was not one to ignore a damsel in distress, so he pulled out a tissue to offer her from his constant supply in his coat pocket. Foss and Zimmerman were often surprised, but just because he was immortal and resistant to all known ailments hadn't stopped his early-developed concern with cleanliness. The girl had clearly been just as absorbed in her own thoughts as him, as his gesture of the tissue took her completely by surprise. She jerked her head over to look at him, stuttering out a quiet thank you, and he took this quick chance to study her more carefully.

Judging by her age, she was definitely a student, probably undergraduate. This was confirmed by stuffed book bag resting on the bench on her other side, torn and frayed at the seams. She wore dark jeans stuffed into riding boots that had seen better days, and was bundled up in a black pea coat with a thick, bright purple scarf wrapped around her neck, almost obscuring her face.

Her face….it was not the face of a carefree college student, instead it was sallow and gaunt. His first reaction had been to assume she was gravely sick, but ignoring the ear trauma, she otherwise looked very healthy. Noticing all the other indicators, he realized that her complexion was simply the result of being indoors for many, many months – he suspected, given a few days in the sun and some hearty home cooked meals, the sickly yellow would brighten to a rich olive.

She turned away, gently dabbing the tissue to her ear, and Nikola reached his conclusion.

_Human…._

How dull.

He tried to return to his game, but found it impossible to focus. Her music was still blaring; one of the few times he disliked his enhanced hearing were times like these. He turned back to ask her to turn her music down, but saw that the offensive IPod in question was already gone, placed into her book bag. However, the music remained, growing louder and louder, more chaotic by the second.

She made eye contact with him once more, probably unintentionally, and this time he noticed the shine of a contact in one of her murky brown eyes.

_Oh my. Abnormal. _

And then.,,,, Realization struck. He knew what kind of Abnormal she was.

_Shit._

* * *

He hesitated to say anything, unsure how she would react or even if she was aware of what she was doing. He had to, though. He couldn't resist. Not if she was what he suspected.

"Pardon me, but, how soon will it happen?" He tried to say it with as much grace and unobtrusiveness as possible.

She tried to feign ignorance, but he noticed her breath catch. "Uh, I don't know what you-"

"I can hear you, my dear. I don't mean to alarm you, but I've met other…." He stopped mid sentence, unsure how to talk to her without scaring her. Luckily, she seemed to understand what he meant.

"You've met some of my…. relatives before?" she said hesitantly.

"Uh, yes."

"Oh. Um. Soon. I think. In the next hour. I've never…"

"Ah."

He had to text Foss.

* * *

Henry had barely noticed 'Vlad the Impossible' leave the room, and had not paid much thought to where the man was until he received the text.

**_Field trip's over. Leave. Maybe take your college buddy with you. ~ T_**

What the hell? He quickly sent a text back.

**_What's happening? Is it SCIU? Hollow Earth?_**

He had a response almost instantly.

**_No. Probably doesn't have anything to do with us. But just to be safe, since Helen would kill me if I got your fur all mussed, grab the prof and go._**

That was…. well, more concerned, then Tesla usually was. Henry found the idea of Tesla being concerned extremely weird, but realized that this wasn't the time to hesitate. He didn't understand the man like Magnus seemed to, but he had known him long enough. If Tesla were just trying to get him to leave because he'd grown bored, he wouldn't have mentioned Dr. Foster.

"Hey Doc? Mind if we continue this conversation elsewhere? How about dinner somewhere downtown?"

Dr. Foster seemed to notice the emphasis Henry put in the request as well as his recent interest in his phone, and consented quickly. They were soon out the door, heading to the parking lot. Henry sent one last text to Tesla.

**Ok, we're going. What's happening?**

This time he didn't get a response until they had reached the car.

**History.**

* * *

There were many names for the Abnormal sitting next to Nikola Tesla, each with as incorrect a mythology as his own noble race. Combining all of them together came the closest to the truth.

Oracle. Seer. Muse. Siren. Harpy. Fate.

Her complexion gave it away. She was clearly Greek, and as Helen was fond to remind anyone who went to her dull lectures, hyper-species DNA would dominate normal human DNA. Of course, there was the offshoot from her species that had a fair Norse complexion, leading to the myths of the Norn, but the Mediterranean heritage made the identification all that much easier. She was wearing one colored contact, to hide the one eye that was pale grey, not brown. It was not an uncommon trait among humans, but when you want to blend in, it's easy enough to cover up.

The final nail was the music. She had been using the IPod to cover it up, but had given up when it was clearly not helping.

James would've been thrilled to be here; he had made a point of meeting as many of her kind as possible, and had introduced several to Nikola. Regardless of what they were called, these Abnormals were able to sense where and when monumental events in history were happening. When they predicted good events, the Greeks called them Muses, and claimed they were inspiration incarnate, and when they sensed doom, they were rejected and cast aside as the cruel, emotionless Oracles at Delphi.

The way their ability worked had always been a topic of debate among The Five. John and Nigel were content to assume they simply maintained a low-level psychic field at all times, monitoring the thoughts and ideas of a community. Helen and James suspected it wasn't a psychic ability at all, but was an enhanced ability of the brain to unconsciously process all the subtle signifiers of human behaviors, but it worked out to the same thing. They knew when something big was going to happen.

The music was a side effect of a strong event being sensed; they weren't conscious of their abilities, so the subconscious anticipation manifested itself as best it could. Those who were artists were driven to create, and even those with the most basic training would feel compelled to sing, to let out the enormous amount of tension building within. This girl sitting next to him had been fitting it, covering it up, but now Nikola could see her shaking, trying to keep the noise in. Given that he could hear actual music, regardless of its quality, he suspected John and Nigel had been correct, and she was telepathically projecting what she could not produce out loud.

She was clever, really. A college was the best place to be for a young Muse. She would meet amazing people at the beginning of their careers, and no one would look twice at a girl suddenly overwhelmed by creative impulses. Given what he was hearing, given the fraction of what she sensed that she was unintentionally projecting, whatever was coming was not very nice. It certainly wasn't what she must've hoped for, her first time.

He understood the young, scared, overwhelmed Abnormal sitting next to him. He had seen history happen, felt it in his bones, known that he was witnessing something that would change the world for all time.

If Foss had been here, he would've said something flippant, something about Nikola considering his own work to be that important. The boy would've been surprised to know that even Nikola could admit this was bigger than him. Muses didn't gravitate to a person, they didn't recognize one man's impact on it's own. They sensed the intricacies that would take historians decades to sort out, the underpinning shifts in society that came crashing down in an instant.

Pity and sympathy were cruel emotions that put the giver above the recipient. He did not pity her. He did not feel sympathy for her.

He looked at the girl sitting next to him and saw her fighting to stay still, biting into her lips, clenching her fists; her eyes squeezed tight trying to will the impossible tension away. Without hesitation he put an arm around her, and she instantly responded, leaning her head against his chest with a heavy sigh and a partial sob.

Nikola Tesla felt empathy for her.

* * *

**Wowza, I have followers! That is totally awesome, thanks guys! Even better than follows are reviews, cause that let's me know what you're thinking. This is probably not where you thought the story was going, but I hope you like it anyways! I wrote a lot more than I expected, and I couldn't bring myself to cut this into smaller pieces. Only one chapter after this – like I said before, short story, I'm not attempting to create a new OC.**


	4. Aftermath

It would take months, years, even, before anyone really knew exactly what had happened that day. Only moments before, it had been typical, peaceful college campus, people coming and going, and the occasional burst of raucous laughter carrying across the green lawns.

The next, a minor spat had started, the first shouts diluted by the various clumps of students chatting away. Two people in a rush, not looking where they were going, had collided. Some electronic gadget, valuable to one of them, fell and shattered, and the other reached for it without thinking, with a hand that should've been wearing a glove that he had accidentally left at home. While he had been looking up, murmuring his first apologies, a random metallic shard pierced his skin, drawing blood.

At that instant in time, one human saw someone with scales on their hands, someone bleeding silver. In that instant, she saw proof of what she'd heard whispered in the hallways, and on the web, and by a crazy British doctor on television before the woman's lab had exploded, several months ago. It was something her mind told her not to believe was real. Another day, the girl would've been amazed and curious and kind, or she would've run away, telling no one what she saw, but not today.

At that instant in time, one angry, exhausted, frustrated human saw her day being ruined by someone, some _thing_ with scales on their hands, some _thing _that bled silver. Before her mind could catch up, she had said words, hateful, mean words, which she would regret for the rest of her life. They were words that the injured Abnormal in front of her could've brushed off, could have forgiven. However, her words carried, too far, to the surrounding groups of people going about their day.

It was just a moment, a single moment in time.

The peaceful, college campus exploded.

* * *

There are always iconic pictures of historic events. Otherwise, how could they truly be called important? How else could people pass on the emotion of the time?

This one contains two people, two innocents swept up in the chaos. They are both bleeding heavily from injuries on their faces, the red and silver blood mixing as they huddle together, trying to protect each other from the madness surrounding them. They both look in the same direction off to the side, their eyes terrified, and their mouths pleading to be sparred, where some unknown aggressor is stalking toward them. Human or Abnormal, no one looking at the image will ever know.

However, if you look closely in the corner, there are two more people in the image. You can barely make out that it is a man and a woman, and even that is just based on their clothes and the faint ouline of their proportions. They are both bundled up for the weather, wearing dark coats and there's a hint of a purple scarf, and the man is holding the woman in his arms. Neither of them are facing the camera, so there's no way to tell who they are.

Some say, with sympathy and pity, that they must be humans, trying to ignore the chaotic violence surrounding them, unable to understand what is going on, and trying to wish the world back to normal. Others say, with unbridled disgust and utmost certainty, that they are Abnormals, willfully turning their backs on their fellows, burying their heads in the sand together in order to sleep peacefully at night.

There is a third group of people, who look at the picture, and simply see two people sitting on a bench.

* * *

They sat on that bench for a long time, unmoving, until finally the noise and shouting dulled, and the music grew quiet. The smell of blood lingered in the air, radiating towards them from every direction. Eventually, Nikola felt the girl shift slowly out of his arms, and he let her. Neither of them spoke; neither of them felt the need to.

As she stood up and reached for her book bag, he gently placed a hand on her arm, the other reaching into one of his many coat pockets. As she turned around, she saw him opening a thin metal case, pulling out a small card that he then handed over to her before standing up himself.

When Nikola had moved to the New Sanctuary a few months ago, Helen had given him the case and its contents. He thought it was pointless but he held on to it because it was from her. Now as the girl looked over what he had handed her, and then looked up at him with eyes full of gratitude, he felt the briefest flicker of understanding. They parted without speaking, walking in opposite directions.

* * *

When Tesla arrived at the hotel, Henry said nothing. He had been watching the news on TV for the last few hours, but he had a feeling Nikola did not need to be filled in on what had happened. He didn't ask, though.

* * *

She never told anyone she had been there when it happened. She never mentioned the kind, quiet man next to her on the bench, who had given her a tissue and stayed by her side. She still had the card; she never went anywhere without it.

She never called the number on it, but no matter how many years went by, she still had the utmost confidence that he would answer if she did. She had never doubted it's contents, not for an instant.

_SANCTUARY  
FOR ALL_

_Dr. Nikola Tesla_

_P.h.D_

* * *

**And there we are, my first story completed! I struggled a lot with this chapter - I always intended to spend more time in Tesla's head. However, the more I wrote, the more I realized that trying to draw comparisons between this and real historical moments would feel very contrived. I didn't want to force my story to seem legitimate by making somewhere sit there and say "Gosh, this is just like that time I happened to be there when _ occurred." I hope that came across. Thanks for reading and leave me a review to let me know what you thought!**


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